ALASKA. 13 



does not possess auy ot'tlie abover-mentioned qualifications in the 

 same degree by any means. Tlie island of Kodiak and the wliole 

 district is, however, rugged and niountainous, with numerous 

 small lakes and tiny rivers or streams, up which a considerable 

 number of salmon run every year. Timber, of spruce and fir, 

 grows in fair (juantity in the northern and eastern end of Ko- 

 diak, all the islands to the eastward, and down the Peninsula 

 as far as Chignik Bay ; it is not large, but in size for fuel, rough 

 building, &c. Grass grows most luxuriantly, especially on Ko- 

 diak, but the area suitable for its support is limited, there be- 

 ing no plains or dry and accessible valleys in which to cut and 

 cure it. There are many winters here in which cattle might 

 be kept in small numbers without exceptional care and expense, 

 i. e.j enough to aftbrd milk and beef for a small settlement, and 

 also sheep and hogs. Little patches of land can be found 

 where a small garden will thrive consisting of potatoes, turnips, 

 &c. ; but reaching down to the Aleutian Islands, and over them, 

 is a region bare entirely of ti-mber and nearly so of shrubbery, 

 rugged, abrupt, and extremely mountainous, the surface broken 

 into patches set, as it were, on end^ this is no country adapted 

 for agriculture, for the prevalence of foggy, dark weather would 

 render even the limited area that could be ntilized with sun- 

 light nnserviceable for the production of fruits and vegetables. 

 Soil there is sufficiently rich and deep, but it is too cold to ma- 

 ture or ripen garden-products, except in very favored locali- 

 ties where, as at Ounalashka, a few potatoes of inferior quality, 

 good turnips, and lettuce, are in the favorable seasons raised. 

 The Western Islands are all essentially volcanic, with scarcely a 

 trace of sedimentary rock to be found ; consisting of high, 

 steep ridges and peaks of porphyries and volcanic tufa, with 

 here and there syenitic granites. The vegetation, such as it is, 

 principally Empetrum nigrum, grows most rank and luxuriant 

 on the flanks and even the summits of many of these high 

 places, and the light, frail stems of this plant, which are of about 

 the size of strawberry-vines, the natives gather and bring down 

 from the hills in large bundles lor fire-wood. The only shrub that 

 lifts its head above the earth, of value as wood, is a willow, {iSalix 

 reticulata,) which grows in scattered clumps along the little water- 

 courses, twisted and contorted, yet of sufficient size to furnish 

 in early days strong and serviceable frames for native skin- 

 boats or <' baidars." Scattered over the Aleutian Islands and 

 on the Peninsula are many' small lakes, some of them quite 



